i will see you someday again in the clouds
by Morghen
Summary: "You spend your days rotting away/You spend your days thinking of him." My first story with a nonlinear timeline. M&MWP. Rated "T" for language.


**_my eyes are glistening with the ghosts of my past  
the memories that we once had_**

You spend your days rotting away.

You spend your days thinking of him.

**X**

The crisp autumn air ruffles your hair and swings your scarf. Your eyes are glued to the pitch in front of you—searching for a particular person.

"James Potter!" roars the announcer.

You smile.

**X**

"Don't be so sad all the time," he whispers before he kisses you.

Can't he see you weren't born to be happy?

**X**

You watch him from afar. Those hazel eyes captivate you—that shining smile entrances you.

But you only like him as a brother, right? You only long to be his friend, correct?

No, no, no.

**X**

"I've kissed him." The words tumble out before your temporary courage runs dry. You look him straight in the eye this time (his eyes are so, so cold). "I've fucked him."

Rodolphus' stare falters momentarily, but when his jaw clenches you know what's to come. He raises a hand and strikes you across the face but never utters a word.

You touch the burning spot tenderly and feel a tear stream down onto your finger. "I love him" comes out in trembling syllables.

He shakes his head in disgust and walks away.

**X**

"Rabastan, eh? He's nothing but a heartless bastard."

If only you could be.

**X**

It starts with a "you played really great today" and ends with his tongue tangled with yours and your hands running through his hair.

It's perfect, really.

It's never going to last, actually.

**X**

You drop the _Prophet_ the second you read the headline.

Your heart stops. Your feelings cease. Your death begins.

James Potter is dead.

**X**

The crashing of the waves rings in your ears. The smell of salt is strong to a sickening point. You lie quietly on the cold stone floor, despite the fact that you have a bed beside you.

Azkaban may be a prison, but you're no prisoner to it.

Oh no, you're only a prisoner to your mind.

**X**

"You are to marry Blythe Nott." Your father's tone has an air of authority and irrevocability about it that matches the look that his eyes give you.

You're taller than he now and you have to tilt your chin down to look him in the face. "I won't."

**X**

He wipes a tear from your cheek and kisses your lips. It's different now—everything's different now. The disappointment in his eyes (he looks at you as though you're just another Death Eater). The finality in his kiss (it's goodbye for good).

He leaves you alone, trapped in the prison of your mind and consumed by your regrets.

He leaves with the key to your prison in hand.

**X**

You go along with them. You've never been strong enough to refuse your elder brother.

You take part in their torture.

You relish their screams of pain.

You deny their pleas for mercy.

You make them suffer as you do.

**X**

"I know a place where we can go and nobody will find us."

His eyes light up and he looks interested. That half grin crosses his face when ideas of how to use such a room cross his mind.

You lead him to the invisible door and repeat the instructions your brother told you once before long ago.

The place is the Room of Requirement.

The place is filled with more than just your dark secrets.

**X**

He speaks of summer and basking in its sunlit glory—on a beach, in the forest, through some Muggle streets. "Places where it won't matter that I'm me and you're you."

You hate when he talks about the future.

**X**

You pull your lengthy red hair back with one hand and grope the cold ground for the sharp rock you found earlier.

He loved your hair.

You desperately try to cut it all off—you hack at it mercilessly with the stone. It falls in bunches and litters the floor of your cell as the wind sweeps it around.

He loved your hair.

You hate it (it just serves as another reminder of him).

**X**

"I love your hair," he says as he runs his hand through your deep auburn locks.

You smile and feel a light blush color your cheeks.

He twists strands around his finger and then lets them all fall back. He picks up a bunch and drapes the lengthy curls over his own hair (the red contrasting beautifully with the jet black) and he laughs. "How do I look?"

"Like a Lestrange."

**X**

You're walking alone through Hogsmeade when he pulls you into a narrow alleyway between two buildings. He pushes your back against the brick wall as he claims your lips with his own.

"You looked cold," he says, touching your reddened nose with his pointer finger. "I thought I could get you warmed up a bit."

James leans towards you again, but you pull away. "I thought you had plans with your friends…?" You try to suppress your jealousy, but it clings in an obvious manner to the last word.

He frowns and then shrugs with shoulders. "They can wait…"

You lean toward him and stop right before your lips meet his. With a smirk, you take hold of his scarf and remove it from his neck. "This will keep me plenty warm."

He raises his dark eyebrows. "You want to wear it?"

"Yeah." You wrap it around your own neck. "How do I look?"

"Like a Gryffindor."

**X**

Dead. Dead. Dead.

How can he actually be dead?

**X**

He's never more alive than when he's flying, you notice. The way the wind licks his hair and kisses his cheeks, the look of determinedness on his face, the way he soaks in all of the attention and all of the praise.

James is only truly and completely alive when on the Quidditch Pitch.

You admire (envy) him.

**X**

The wind howls outside the walls of your stone cell. You wonder if you're going insane. You wonder if the rest of the inmates can hear it, too. Does the wind whisper the same word to them over and over again?

"J a m e s s s ," it sings in an almost snake-like way. "J a m e s s s s."

"Stop it!" you shriek. "Just stop!" Your fingers frantically grasp at what remains of your once flowing hair and pull, pull, pull as you continue to scream for it to cease. You drop to your knees as your body trembles all over. "Please," you cry, you beg. "Please stop…"

"J a m e s s s s."

**X**

"Expelliarmus!"

You back slowly against the wall as you hear your wand clatter to the floor beside him. You raise your hands up in a motion of surrender, not because you're without a wand, but because you've no wish to fight him.

He walks toward you, throwing a cautious glance over his shoulder to assure you two are alone in the room. He stops before you—his wand prodding your throat.

Cinnamon meets sapphire for the first time in years. It's a supernova as hurt, anger, hesitance, and love meet all at once. You both blink—you both shudder.

"James," you croak, your throat dry. "I'm—I'm so sorry."

**X**

"You're nothing—a nobody," your elder brother tells you for the millionth time. Your mother is within earshot but doesn't care—she never cares. He's tall for his eleven years and towers over you as he approaches. "No one will ever love you," he taunts (or maybe promises) as he shoves you roughly to the floor.

You don't stand up until he leaves because you know he'll just push you once more. This has happened often enough for you to learn (oh, have you ever learned). This has happened often enough for you to be convinced (oh, he must be right).

No one will ever love you.

**X**

"I love you," he breathes, and he kisses your lips tenderly.

Your eyes flash open as the three words you thought you would never hear (thought you never deserved) reach your ears. You hold him closer to you as if he'll vanish like smoke if you don't as you repeat his words over and over in your mind. "Thank you"—the words barely come out as you're flooded with feelings you didn't know existed.

**X**

You both sit in the drawing room of your parents' mansion. Your eyes are on him and his eyes are on you. He's so much colder and his once attractive features have fled since he became a follower of the Dark Lord. You touch your forearm as you wonder if the same will happen to you—if you'll become a shell of your former self as your brother has.

"I wish to die," you mutter, your eyes finally leaving his hauntingly unfamiliar face.

Rodolphus scoffs. "You're too much of a coward to off yourself. You've always been a coward."

You know he's right.

**X**

"You don't have to…"

And you know you don't because all that rides on this decision is the lives of a family who would never risk the same for you. A brother who only puts you down. A mother who never cared. A father who is much too busy to trouble with you. "I do—I don't really have a choice."

That's when his expression changes. That's when he begins to see you as one of them.

And that's when you sever bonds with the only person ever to have loved you.

**X**

The autumn leaves crackle under you as you fall to your knees. The weight of the world feels as if it's resting on your shoulders and you just crumble (you never were strong enough).

You press five kisses against the cold gravestone before you (one for each letter that spells out his name). You rest your forehead on the marker as your breath comes out in trembles. Salty tears escape from your glassy orbs and run down your nose, dripping onto the dry leaves beneath you.

"I love you." Your voice is merely a whisper and your words are years too late.

**X**

You spend your days rotting away.

You spend your days thinking of him.

**X**

* * *

**The lyrics at the beginning belong to the song "The Undertaker's Thirst for Revenge is Unquenchable" and sometimes called "The Final Battle" by Chiodos. The title is from the same song.**

**Rabastan/James is a M&MWP so please give a mention if you decide to write this pairing. A link on my profile will take you to our forum ^_^**

**I had a lot of ideas that I had to leave out of my last RabJames fic (embrasse-moi) and so I decided to write them and try out the nonlinear timeline idea at the same time. In this, there are also parts of scenes taken from embrasse-moi.  
**

**Thank you, mew, for betaing!  
**


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